Getting back to normal...sorta

So six of the little baby chicks (1 rooster and 5 hens) have found a new home in some pretty sweet digs.  We made $60 on their sale which about covered the cost of feed.  So a break even.  The sale was to a friend of ours who is starting her flock.  Catching the little buggers was interesting.  There were 10 all in one run and so I thought it best to pull the ones for my friend from there.  That way she wouldn't have to worry about integrating chickens from 2 different coops.  Rubic helped me out at first by closing off the door to the coop once I had gone to the back door of the coop with feed and lured them all inside.   I then proceeded to pull them out one at a time and if it was one I needed, it went in the dog kennel (not with a dog FYI).  If it wasn't one I needed it went back into the run.  All goes well until the very last of the 10 chickens (of course).  She panics and almost gets thru the blockade Rubic had put in place.  Had she managed to get past there, she would have been mixed in with the ones that were staying and I would have had to go thru them again (minus the ones in the kennel.  So I rush to keep her in the coop and , yes, in doing so forgot about the back door being open.  Yea...I go around the back to find her OUT!  So the second way Rubic helped me out was catching the little red hen.  Between the two of us we managed to corner her and get her into the kennel to go to her new home. 

Once we have picked out the six hens and 1 rooster we are keeping; one of two things will happen.  If we have a glut of roosters left, they will become meat for the freezer.  If we have enough hens left, we have a buyer lined up.  Once we have that all situated, and the flock is down to 8 (2 roosters and 6 hens), we are planning on revamping the old coop and then attaching it to the new run.  In other words we will have 2 coops attached to one run.

The original coop, once revamped, will be attached there in the front right (your right)side.  We will create a new window on that side.  The old PVC run will be broken down and the pipe reused to make a hoop house to cover one of my concrete raised beds.  This will allow me to start seeds earlier and to hopefully extend my gardening of cooler weather crops.  Then the plan is to have one rooster and 3 hens per coop with a shared run.  That being said, we will have a divider up to keep the roosters from mingling.  Cause that would be BAD!  Lol.  We may change our minds and only have 1 rooster (Sound of doom for poor shmuck that isn't kept), but for now we will keep two.  N.O.A.H has released their forecast for winter and our area in the southeast is due for below normal temps and above normal precipitation.  For that reason we are trying to get this stuff done before that happens. 

Also on our outside to do list is to water seal the new deck steps,  the coop/runs and to pressure wash the house before winter.  Winter is so dreary in Jan I would prefer to at least have the house nice and white. 

Inside the house things are returning to normalcy in that I am able to start baking again.  That can be good or bad depending on your weight loss goals.  Lol.  Back to making bread, cookies, etc.  As things get more caught up and weather runs us inside, I will be able to get the house seriously cleaned and ready for Christmas décor. 

So while the list is still long, and we won't get everything done, we are slowing down a little and returning to normal.  Well as normal as we can be.